First: You'll never have to hear it again, I swear. Voting for the 2009 Bloggies ends today, and I really wouldn't mind coming in 4th place instead of dead last, so if you haven't voted, well, don't make me beg. It's unbecoming. While you're there, Secret Agent Mama is up for Best Photog, Blog Nosh is up for Best New Blog and Best Blog Design, all of my favorite Aussie blogs are up for Best Australian, Craftastrophe is up for Best Arts & Crafts, BlogHer is up for Best Communtiy and Television Without Pity is up for Best Entertainment and, well, um, The Donor sort of knows the girl that started that. Um, you know, *knows*? Yeah, vote for it. Moving on....

Secondly: I am not many things. I am not a professional anything. I barely qualify as a mother on my best days. What I am, however, is someone who is very capable of learning from her own mistakes. Which are many in numbers. The most recent thing I've learned: I am NOT a doctor. Hell, I'm not even a pharmacist.

A really long time ago, I was prescribed some lovely brain candy to treat a whole bunch of stuff that began with Post. It was gorgeous. It worked like a charm, and I didn't chew my fingernails or grind my teeth or freak out about my new baby. And then I stopped taking it. The worst things that happened when I stopped were treatable by a manicurist and a dentist.

And then a not so long time ago, I started some new brain candy. If the old stuff was Tootsie Pops, the new stuff would be Pop Rocks: Hard core, has urban legends about. It did what it was supposed to do, which was to work without me noticing it was working, and it had one totally freaking fabulously awesomeiddity (is to a word) side effect that if I explained to you, I'd be crossing the imaginary line my husband has drawn in the sand for what I can and cannot tell you about our relationship. Yes, he actually has one and yes, I actually stick to it. Kind of.

*ahem*

Of course I didn't realize said awesomeness had anything to do with the pills and not the fact that I'm finally that age where parts of you peak until I decided that since I hadn't noticed any effects of the pills, they must not be having any and I stopped taking them. Because I'm that moron.

Thankfully, nothing too major came of my sudden cessation of medication, but I did notice that something was different. Just a subtle, quiet little something way in the back of my head, just enough that I realized maybe I shouldn't go running around self unmedicating.

You know what the Pop Rocks pills didn't ever help? The nails, the teeth, the tension. The obvious stuff. I realized I really missed that, and dear god in heaven I needed Awesome Side Effect to come back, so I decided to start taking both the Pop Rocks and the Tootsie Pops again, together. I asked my doctor first, shut up.

I started the Tootsie Pops first, and waited for the Miracle From Heaven that they brought the first time to rain down on me again. It didn't. So I added the Pop Rocks back in. And I waited. I waited kind of a while and the Tootsie Pops never really did much of anything that I needed them to. I'm sure they did something, but not what I cared for them to. So after a few months on both, I decided that I didn't want to unnecessarily take two medications when only one was doing what I wanted it to. So I dropped the Tootsie Pops.

Smarter things in my life I've done include but are not limited to: wearing white pants and a maxi-pad, upside down, twice; letting my 8 year old color my hair; walking 2 blocks home from 7-11 to find my car stolen from outside of my house, then remembering almost an hour later that I'd driven it the 2 blocks to 7-11.

I figured that I'd quit them once before with absolutely no ill effects whatsoever, but what I didn't figure was that maybe I was on, like, 4 times the dosage the second time around.

Hello withdrawals.

Of course, I wasn't expecting withdrawals and so I didn't realize that they were withdrawals and I instead figured I'd caught the stomach flu, then the regular flu, then the plague, and then I was clearly either being poisoned with carbon monoxide, experimented on by aliens, or even worse, pregnant.

Insomnia is a funny, funny thing. I've never really had it before, and all I can say is I'm glad I didn't have a day job. Also, being a zombie must really suck. No wonder they eat everyone's brains; they're pissed that you can SLEEP.

The good news is that after only a few (of the freaking longest of my life) weeks, I could see straight, my head didn't hurt, I wasn't afraid to leave my house anymore, the vertigo was gone and I got to sleep. Finally. The bad news is that hot flashes in the middle of the night have nothing at all to do with withdrawing from the Tootsie Pops, and that just insists on happening anyway.